At the last conference, there was a talk on starting your own brewery. There is a lot involved on the paperwork side of things and liscense fees, along with insurance and other costs. It would be hard for me to pay for all of that at 10 gallons a batch. 7 barrels looked to be the minimum size brewhouse that would let you tend to the rest of the business when you are not brewing.

Yeah, Sam did it at DFH on a 10 gallons Sabco, but he was brewing 3 or more batches a day.

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Jeff RankertAnn Arbor Brewers GuildAHA Governing Committee BJCP NationalHome-brewing, not just a hobby, it is a lifestyle!

At least if they streamline it from the state's perspective that's a help. I don't know how much the feds have to say about the brewery itself and what is required for licensing, but I know some towns around here are more restrictive and harder to work with with more requirements than others. That's a factor when people decide where to open their breweries. So if the local stuff in ND is more permissive that would make it easier. Of the nanos at home I can think of around here, all of them have been required to have a separate building for the brewery.

I think we are required to spend $1000 per year for ABC lic. for the right to sell, not to mention Fed. and State taxes. There's also a background check along with all kinds of local regs I am sure aren't included in that bill (for instance, we were required to have "food grade lights" which costs well over $5K. They were cheap compared to the sewer upgrades the city made us install.) We have one guy who's job it is to take care of all the TTB and local regs. The TTB is not too bad, but they require approval of everything, and you can't sell without approval.. Quite frankly, on the homebrew level, it is going to be way, way, way more trouble and money than it is worth.

When I lived in TX, some places allowed homeowners to run what they called an "icehouse" if I remember correctly. Basically they were small pubs in a garage, kind of. I stopped at a couple just for the hell of it. I'd be hard pressed to believe they all had the same Federal licensing... to sell beer out of their garage? It will be interesting to see what is entailed in allowing homebrewers to sell their brew... I'd love to see Michigan do the same and with the economy the way it currently is, it wouldn't suprise me. Great idea imo.

Edited to add... maybe they'll downsize the ATF or reduce its responsibilities, wasn't it created as a response to prohibition? Sure its money gathered for the federal government in license fee's but they could just as eaily add a fee per pint sold etc. like a sales tax and eliminate a boatload of government employees along with government pensions.

I was thinking about this last night on my way home from work. If the Federal, State, and Local governments all got on the same page on this, it might be worth it for Joe Homebrewer to open his nano. My idea was to make the licensing fees dependent on the amount of beer being brewed and/or sold.

Say Joe brews 100 gallons for sale. Instead of paying $1,000.00 per year for License X, he pays $100.00 (or some other percentage of the total licensing fee), so he can test his products and get his feet wet in the industry.

Obviously that only takes into account the licensing fees and doesn't include other stuff like packageing or ingredients, etc. but it's something to think about.

I really don't understand the big deal, do people really think they'll get rich selling homebrew? Would you be allowed to sell to other states? export? or is this just for ND? and what does Fed have say about all the taxes/rules/permits?

What happens when some kid gets drunk after buying homebrew? Talk about a $hitstorm for homebrewers after that happens.